Phone Booth energy(lack there of)

[g00n]

Opposition fans take over both our soccer and American Football arena, with alarming frequency. And are often louder. Have Caps or Skins ever done that at even 1 opposition arena? It's more than just the number of games. It seems like Sabres fans have made it to DC, and they suck more than we do. I have heard some allege DC fans are "fair weather" fans.

Pertaining to hockey alone, events that cause cheering have diminished. Fights used to get almost everyone out of their seats, most cheering as long as our Kaminski or Bradley weren't getting pummeled. Lucky for us - we always had guys good with their dukes. The ooohs and ahhs during long fights were loud. Cheering after a fight won vs a punk that needed it, were as loud as goal cheers.

Scrums used to be common place, and now are a rarity. That got the blood flowing, for both players and fans. Hitting does the same. Gone, it's all gone.

There simply isn't enough goal scoring to fill the void. Mario's vision of a wide open high scoring game was squashed by huge goalies and the couches on their legs, that we call pillows.

People come to DC from other areas for government work so fanbases travel here by osmosis, but DC is also a tourist destination because of museums, parks, the Zoo, government buildings, monuments, etc. As a pretty niche team and fanbase I would expect more visiting fans coming here than Caps fans going abroad, even in the best of times.

 

[Devil Dancer]

We used to get compliments on fan enthusiasm at the Phone Booth earlier in the Ovechkin era. HFers in particular were sometimes jealous of our rocking arena.

Years of disappointment will put a damper on that.

 

[John Price]

Load of Crap I have season tickets it's always loud during postseason

 

[Acallabeth]

I got roasted here last time I said that. If you pay $200 to watch a game, you cheer them hard win or lose. I never understood the people that just sit back, say nothing and leave early if the team is losing by a significant margin.

I'm not sure why you got roasted, I never understood personally what's the appeal of going to a game and then acting like you're in front of your TV.
Then again, different fandom traditions.

 

[Ms Maggie]

Is there a correlation between crowd noise and winning?

As for European soccer. Yeah that ole ole ole ole never gets old.

 

[Hivemind]

As for European soccer. Yeah that ole ole ole ole never gets old.

It gets old the second time you hear it.

 

[marcel snapshot]

I find the fan experience at the Verizon Center to be moldy, old, and tired. Unleash The Fury, everybody clap your hands, all the other between-whistle, dumbed-down video monitor audience participation rituals, and the relentless blaring of terrible music at volumes that make conversation impossible (and I'm somebody that goes to lots of live music shows and likes listening to music loud). It may have been OK in 2009, but 8 years later it just seems dated and dense.

They've been doing the same thing at the VC for the last 10 years (except that each year they make it harder to talk your seatmates between whistles) and it's just gotten so stale after 10 years of playoff failure, that it starts to feel a little Orwellian to have them continue to pump out the same old crap.

Go ahead, call me a grumpy bitter killjoy, but this is all of a piece. Something worked a long time ago and we're loathe to change it, even though a change is long overdue.

 

[RandyHolt]

Sounds spot on Marcel - send that to someone at the Caps - but not thanks Ted.

It IS always the same. The crowd noise meter is the volume meter on the sound system amp. They compensate for quiet crowds with louder music. The more boring the product, the louder they make it in a feeble attempt to make fans think it is exciting.

C A P S whisper caps caps caps.